There is a related problem for Twitter which reminds me of the Altavista/Google days.

Zuckerberg has said that they won't run ads until there is a credible path to 1 billion users.

So for a year or more it will be Threads with no ads. And Twitter with according to their newly hired CEO "full-screen, sound-on" ads.

My Threads feed is full of massive brands promoting itselves already. Since you can't control the feed those are basically free ads. The only major difference will be that in the future those brands will be paying Meta for the privilege. Get the brands addicted with free engagement early on and then once they're good and hooked you start charging.

You can block them, which I’ve been doing more than I’d like today. I blocked Gary Vee, Wendy’s, the UFC, The Verge, Khloe Kardashian, and about a dozen more accounts I would never follow.

The chronological feed is coming soon at which point that will not be an issue.

And as mentioned you can simply Mute/Block them.

But there is going to be a year or more of Threads being ad-free whilst Twitter is not. That's a game changer.

> The chronological feed is coming soon

Not it won't. Facebook removed the chronological feed 10 years ago, they won't reintroduce it in Threads.

"Curated" feeds is how they get announcers to pay for visibility since the user has no control over what it is displayed at a given time

FWIW (not much) Zuck said they don't intend to monetize Threads until there's "a clear path to 1 billion people" https://www.threads.net/t/CuW5-eWL34x

That seems kind of strange to me, though, because 1 billion is more than 3x the entire Twitter user base.

> path to 1 billion people

Also Insta has 1bn+ active MAUs and Meta us leaning heavily on Insta for Threads

Sure, but those 1 billion people could have signed up for Twitter at any point in the last 17 years if they were interested. Twitter already maxed out its user base, so I'm skeptical that there's a 1 billion potential here.

Personally I signed up for threads and have been liking using it so far even though I never really used twitter. I think it has lower startup cost than Twitter because the algorithmic feed really works well without having to manually follow a lot of people. So I think there is reason for Zuck to dream big.

> I think it has lower startup cost than Twitter because the algorithmic feed really works well without having to manually follow a lot of people.

Twitter has an algorithmic feed.

Either way, Threads runs very lightweight, and can easily go 10 years with no revenue.

Also there's a bigger difference which is that FB/Meta ads are in an entirely different league of quality. The only ads I hear people IRL talking about actually buying and liking the products advertised to them are IG.